Microsoft offering bonus Skydrive storage to College Students

By George Ponder
last updated

SkyDrive is a great way to back up and store files in the cloud, and access everything from your tablet, computer or Windows Phone. SkyDrive is a free service with 7GB of storage.  From students (or anyone else for that matter) 7GB might not be enough.

If you're a college student you can get an extra 3GB on top of that. All you need to do is head over here, enter a valid .edu email address, and a free storage code will be sent your way.

There are a few catches though. The extra storage space is only available for a year from redemption. Codes are limited to one per person and the code must be used by December 31, 2013.

It may not be the best deal, but if you need a bump in SkyDrive storage for your college needs, the extra 3GB could come in handy.  Oh... and if you haven't installed the SkyDrive app on your Windows Phone, you can find it here (opens in new tab) in the Windows Phone Store.

George Ponder
George Ponder

George is the Reviews Editor at Windows Central, concentrating on Windows 10 PC and Mobile apps. He's been a supporter of the platform since the days of Windows CE and uses his current Windows 10 Mobile phone daily to keep up with life and enjoy a game during down time.

145 Comments
  • most of us students need it for .doc files and a few images here and there. 
     
    I'm using it heavily for oneNote, so a lot of screenshots, and rough draft essays. 
    I'm takign advantage of this for the next 4 years and see if I will actually use up all of it.  Placing all of my paperwork on skydrive.
     
    How generous of Microsoft.
    http://25.media.tumblr.com/00244cc76e5ac87ac738420f3cc4eed5/tumblr_mndkelRz011qzxfgoo1_1280.png  
  • Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't it unlimited storage for office documents?  Did they change that?
  • And I think if you do the office365 for students which is like 79.99 for 4 years, you get an additional 25gb for free to your SkyDrive
  • Correction, 20GB of Skydrive.
  • Ah thanks, knew it was something like that.
  • I think you're referring to a rumor posted by LiveSide a few years ago
    Read the comment section (http://www.liveside.net/2011/12/15/the-new-hotmail-is-here-questions-ask-hotmailqna-on-twitter/)
  • Now I have 25+20+3 GB!
  • Same here! Haha I was like wow... I have 48 GB of space now.
  • I got 25GB with my account when I signed back when SkyDrive was first announced.
  • Me too. :)
  • Me three ^^
     
  • Me four!
  • Not me :(
  • Me neither :(
  • I did but then they took it away and have been trying to get it back now for a long time with no luck :(
  • Me too! Wth
  • Me Five ! :)
  • Me six :D
  • Yup me too grandfathered in.. Benefits for first adopters and people who read the IT news non stop. 25gigs lol
  • Me 7
  • Me eight! Are we still eligible for the extra 3gb? I don't want to try it and then somehow get downgraded to 10gb.
     
    Edit: Tried the code and it worked fine. 28gb of SkyDrive storage. Wee!
  • Me too. 28GB :)
  • I have 125 GB because I went to the last build :)
  • what do you mean "the last build" and how can you do that. I just got 25GB.
  • I meant the BUILD Conference. They gave us all 100GB of extra SkyDrive storage.
  • I got 25GB free with Box, so I'm fine with missing out on Skydrive.  We're even now!
  • I also got 25gb on box, and 2 months later I got an email telling me that I got to 50gb because I sign in from a Sony device. I don't have any Sony devices!! :D
  • But box has a file-size limit of 250 MB/file :(
  • Me 8
  • Me nine!
  • Yep. Sitting pretty at 28GB.
  • Me too, and I am sooo glad I did!
  • Me too. I guess in this part, early adopter of skydrive really didn't left behind (and even has a special treatment). And with additional 25 GB from box.com, i have a total of 50 GB cloud storage :)
  • Yep ditto, and 25gb with google docs (my prefered system)
  • yup, 25 gb....
  • Yeah...me 10
  • Me too!!
  • I signed up to hotmail more than a decade ago and that surely is"back in the days", and I do remember having 25 GB storage. But since they moved to all new interfaces, its gone down to 7! What a shame!
  • They moved everyone down to 7 a few years ago. You could be grandfathered into 25, but you actually had to go to the website and click a button to keep your storage.
  • and that shows how you didnt even use skydrive.... so why "what a shame"??
     
    they gave like 2 weeks for people to go to 25gb when they said they would take everyone to 7gb for new users, and for old users if they didnt use much their skydrive and they werent using 7gb of their skydrive storage they would algo go to 7gb but as an old user you only had to "buy" back for free the 25gb storage. it was simple as that..
    so you could have been able to get your 25gb but i doubt you really didnt even use it much, im sure you didnt even contact support to ask why 7gb and not 25 when it was downgradedm becauseim sure they would have said you could get your 25gb back by going to X link.
     
    so Microsoft was right and it shows users like you who dont use much skydrive can live with 7gb
  • I'm still grandfathered into my 25gb of storage. But even with that space, maybe I should claim this 3gb just because it's available for me.
  • Very cool to see. I actually pay for 50GB of storage a year, but nice to see MSFT enticing college students with some free GBs.
  • How much $$$ does that cost per year?
  • Its pretty cheap.. Look on the Skydrive website. I think you can get 100 GB for $50 annually.
  • Wow! That's not bad at all..
  • Since I was an early adopter I got 25 GB, plus 20 for Office 365, and now 3 for being in college, I got 48 GB haha. But I do pay for the Office subscription.
  • I wonder if my old college email address still works...
  • Wohoo, most students in Germany don't have an .edu adress.... Thanks for nothing Microsoft!
  • USA! USA! USA!
  • Amen to that
  • It says on the website the offer is intended for college students in the US only anyway.
  • Nah, I'm in Singapore and the offer worked for me. Then again my email address ends in .edu.sg.
  • We should not be surprised by that, its typical microsoft, all services for the US and screw everyone else who wants them; the xbox one announcement was similar, if you are outside the US you are screwed in terms of services you can access.
     
  • USA! USA! USA!
  • Guess what??? I am not a US student but UK, another fail offer from Microsoft which aim only to the American.... 
  • It's a shame this isn't an international offer. Dropbox set a good example of how this should be done with their Space Race promotion for students. 
  • That's true... For some reason Microsoft tries to encourage the American citizens to follow Microsoft and do the opposite with the European citizens... When for example will create a Microsoft store in UK (NOT in Europe, but at least in Engalnd)
  • you can get 20gb free storage here http://forums.wpcentral.com/off-topic-lounge/228250-get-20gb-cloud-storage-now.html#post1990109
  • Sucks to suck.
  • USA! USA! USA!
  • Please, enlighten us why you are chanting for USA? I mean, with a broken economy, millions of homeless people, half of you are to fat, guns for everyone, millions in private prisons, broken healthcare, you are really not doing so good right? But if 3GB of storage a year makes you happy, it's all good.
  • Broken economy? I don't think so. How do I know this? I live there
  • Then you obviously don't know whats going on in your own country. That tells enough about you :)
  • Do you even live in this country? I do. Everyone is fine here including me. You don't always believe in media crap talk.
  • Economy stopped growing for a little bit a few years ago, but things are great now. Most people weren't even affected.
  • "most people weren't even affected"  
     
    You've got to be joking.  Much of the middle class has been stagnant for likely thirty years.   The lower class has been losing ground.   Unemployment is still high.   There's two economy's here, a casino economy at the top likely heading for another bubble and the rest of us trying to recover from the last bubble.
     
     
  • The moral of the story here is that there are more people with jobs than the ones without. If our economy is so shitty we would've had collapse of United States of America.
  • Nope, not joking. A very small percentage of the population lost their jobs, and a small percentage of homeowners ended up losing their homes. But for most of us, our homes have regained their value now, and people are DEFINITELY better off than they were 30 years ago.
    Look around you before listening to some out of touch, activist college professor who doesn't even live in the real world and whose political views are such that he's always got a bone to pick.
  • Or before listening to piers morgan
  • You got something against Dallas, Texas boy?
  • Well, I'm no longer a student. So I didn't get the 3GB.
    As for for the state of my country, where are you from? America is still the greatest nation in the world. Is it all sunshine and lollipops? No, but if you haven't noticed their is a global economic crisis. Hate on haters.
  • USA! USA! USA!
  • USA! USA! USA!
  • USA! USA! USA!
  • USA! USA! USA!
  • USA! USA! USA!
  • USA! USA! USA! Right! They might not like us chanting that, but they have to respect us for standing for something,,, and not falling for nothing...
  • Never thought a topic on here would get political....
  • In soviet Russia online storage get's 3 free you
  • WIll they add 3gb to my 25gb ? :)
    I'll take all I can get, I might not need it now but, at some point I will, I am sure..
     
    Edit: Oh....
    Voucher valid for an extra 3 GB of free SkyDrive storage for one year. Voucher must be redeemed by 12/31/13. 3 GB storage expires one year from voucher redemption. Limit: one voucher per person. Not redeemable for cash or gift cards. Single use only. This voucher is non-transferrable, and may only be redeemed by U.S. college students.
    It expires, oh, well forget for me..
  • Even though I'm a college student, my university email doesn't end with .edu... But I see I'm not alone with my problem.
  • Go to a real school?
  • I tihnk the .edu is common in USA, but it isn't in EU. So this deal is, just like the Xbox One, not really aimed for EU.
  • USA! USA! USA!
  • When will someone get around to deleting these worthless comments?
  • Which ones?
  • Lol!!!
  • So that means I can have 25+3? Hmmm sounds interesting!
  • Thank you MS
  • Is this like the 3 gig codes you get at s MSFT store for buying stuff? U have been told by multiple workers there the 3GBs is not a limited time offer but is permanent.
  • 50GB free storage with BOX
     
    you can get 50GB free storage with box, simply head over to box.com and make a normal free account, once you've made that, email them at ca@box.com with the email you used to sign up for your free account and tell them that the 50GB free storage didn't work for you, or that you heard about the 50GB of free storage, they will email you back letting you know your account has been upgraded, they are extremly nice and very polite
     
    hope this helped some people, you can also use a free service provided by box to automaticly transfer all your data (free up to 10GB) from your current provider (skydrive, dropbox etc...) to your new box service! just reply to my comment if you need any help!
  • Box isn't integrated into WP though.
  • i see, perhaps we can get them to add this feature then?
  • No, I don't think Microsoft is stupid enough to do that to themselves.. But then again..
  • Oh they are. :/
  • They do have an app for WP....
  • How does it work this automatic transfer service? Is it a one-time only, or does it keep all data synced between the two services?
    You could use a IFTTT Recipe...
  • 125  136 geebeez for life!
  • Lawd, that's like almost an SSD hard drive.
  • This is off subject, but nevertheless its extremely WP related,,,... Let me know what you think about my "Custom Hub" idea for WP...
    http://forums.wpcentral.com/general-microsoft-news-discussion/228356-wp-...
  • US only right ?
    Anyway, Shout out to Microsoft for doing this !
  • Again that .edu address... What I should do if I don't have it, but I am a student?
  • ffs what about university students in NZ? :(
  • @Volchonokilli If you are not a COLLEGE STUDENT then you can not do anything to get it.The key word here is College-University not regular high school.Most colleges give you one. I finished college last year but my email from there still active so right now I have 25gb on SkyDrive plus I'm going to claim that .Is going to be 28gb
  • Not all Colleges and Universities use .edu email addresses, IMHO this is a major oversight on the part of MS.
  • I still don't understand why Microsoft downgraded SkyDrive from 25GB to 7GB. I mean, I know the obvious reason but weren't they prepared for such demand if they offered it in the first place? Google recently increased Google Drive to 15 GB.
  • If you want Snapchat on WP then go here.. http://www.snapchat.com/# .. Select "Technical support" then select "My device is incompatible" then choose Windowsphone...
  • Tried it, got an error message ever time - with a google URL, coincidence?
  • Sign the petition...
    www.change.org/petitions/snapchat-create-a-snapchat-app-for-windows-phone-8
  • Does this mean that after 1 year they'll take away that extra 3gb?
  • Thank goodness i am an early adopter. Got 25 gb.
  • I signed for 365office and got some extra space. Also signed for more Reliable space with Microsoft. Reliable, that's what I'm looking for my daughter and family pictures....
  • Me tooo using 25GB of free space on my 2 MS accounts. :)
  • USA! USA! USA!
  • Thanks for the tip, just applied my extra 3gb. Worked just fine for me and my .edu.au email address so no, it is not just a US offer as many are saying.
  • If the offer is working in other countries then that's great for those people. It was meant for US college students though as stated on the website.
  • Yeah, great if you have a .edu email address but in the UK we use .ac.uk. How hard can it be for MS to make this worldwide seeing as they are a GLOBAL company.
  • Yeah, where I study (West Yorkshire) we use .ac.uk - doesn't bother me though as I'm not even scratching the surface of my storage.
  • USA! USA! USA!
  • I have several .edu ids, does that mean I can add multiple 3GBs to my account? Did anyone try that?
    currently 28GB :)
  • Did anyone else notice that the available space remained the same even after adding the free 3 GB storage to your existing account?
  • you can get 20 GB of storage following this link https://copy.com?r=xu22E1 from COPY.
    Sign up & install on one device.
    The service is pretty good already. Winows Mobile support coming soon, as far as I know.
    After you sign up you canearn UNLIMITED storage throuh referral (5GB per referral).
    Check it out.
  • Nice for the students that get the storage, but it's a shame that non-US-Students are excluded from this. MS is a global company that wants to sell its products globally, so it should act accordingly. To all who are going to answer "deal with it" or "USA! USA", could you please forget your nationalism for a second and think about why the paying customers all over the world shouldn't get the same offers?
  • Exactly, couldn't have put it better myself!!!!
  • Exceptionalism. USA! USA! USA!
  • Le sigh. It seems to be more of a "edu only" instead of an "USA only" thing.
  • Works in Australia with an edu.au address. 
  • I got the 25gb from being an early adopter with WP7, but I was getting close to my limit last week, so I looked at the upgrade options, and they are so much cheaper than other cloud firms. I paid £16 ($24) for the year for an extra 50gb. I think this is very reasonable, bearing in mind this is my primary backup. I have my "My Documents and "My pictures" mapped to my SkyDrive folder, so I don't even have to manually backup. And my 920 is set to auto upload photos at full resolution on WiFi too. Now I have 75gb, I've got plenty of room for backing up pics of the kids at full resolution. And Skydrive makes it so much easier than any other storage option too. Just my 2 pennies worth.
  • Ugh, another US only offer. Obviously colleges don't exist outside the US!!!!
  • Its not USA only, works in every country with .edu email address.
  • I need to invest in more Skydrive storage so I can upload my photo albums, including all the RAW files, but trying to work out the best way to sync network folder to Skydrive
     
  • For those who are saying its us only deal, please stop. It works here in malaysia with .edu.my email
  • The more MS stuff you have the more space you should get. I have 2 win 8 laptops and a wp8 phone, plus Xbox 360. Should be 7 gig per device. As Flickr has upped their limit to 1TB. Hopefully MS will up their limit.
  • Can you link multiple Microsoft accounts? I have a MSDN account on a different address, so can get office 365 subscription and more storage..
  • Good guy Microsoft, always understand students and college kids
  • Wait, I have my 25 gb for free with no need to buy office. Can I still grab those extra 3gb?
  • yes you can, i now have 28GB of storage on my skydrive.
  • Guys , im a college student but my university email is .com , not .edu
    Does this mean I dont get the extra 3GB ??
  • You won't be able to participate unless you have a friend who will let you use his .edu address.
  • LOL 3GB Microsoft can do better ...The Best Referral Program...(Copy Referral Program — In possibly the most rewarding referral program in cloud storage history, Copy users can earn 5GB of additional free storage for both themselves and the person they introduce to Copy for each referral, with no limit on the total capacity they can earn. The average Copy referrer has earned well over 60GB of free storage, with the largest referrers earning space in the 10s of TBs), Follow this link to get started with 20 GB. https://copy.com?r=itVLNk
  • SkyDrive give the total 10 GB storatge it is enough for students class work, and docs of a students, your all record no need to keep online every time.  manage your work style and perform  well. thanks sky drive nice one.
  • I've graduated, but my school keeps my address active. I even used it to get a free Xbox from Newegg last year. I'll take the extra gigs, even if it is temporary. :)
  • It's so nice the storage they have been offering, as I've used SkyDrive over the years as a college student, I have close to 50 GB of free storage now at my disposal by taking advantage of many of their offers.
  • sould i try sky drive ??